Monte Carlo R3: Murray vs Benneateau

To be played on Thursday 19th April at 9:30am BST (10:30am local time).

Andy will be first on Court Central and will head over to Court 2 to play the doubles with Jamie against the Bryan's at 12:30pm BST (1:30pm local time) or after suitable rest.

Next up for Andy is Julien Benneteau (ranked at a near career high #31) who beat 15th seed Jurgen Melzer 6-4, 6-3 today. Andy holds a 2-0 record against Benneteau but their most recent match was the Cincinnati Quarter-Finals in 2009 and they have never met on Clay.

Hopefully we see a repeat of the Troicki match yesterday and Andy continues his fine start to the Clay season. The prize is a place in the Quarter Finals against Thomas Berdych or Kei Nishikori.

Really looking forward to this. C'mon Andy!

NB: Updated picture of Andy this time to satisfy the complaints after the last thread. (Bev)

Yep and as Andy said after the Troicki match yesterday he is also a former French Open Quarter-Finalist. However that was a long time ago now, but is proof of Benneateau's clay credentials.

As EJ said, it mostly all comes down to Andy's performance. If he's on song like he was yesterday he should face few problems.

Andy has certainly started his clay season feeling very confident and this confidence is based on his performance last year. He maybe looking forward to playing both Nole and Nadal already as he feels the least pressure against them and this being clay makes it all the more worthwhile to give it a real shot. I guess we will see. His next match will be tough either way after Benneateau but not going to look any further than that for now.

Another note to take into account is that, Andy put forward a brilliant play in his first match here in MC and that’s over two weeks of break in between, whereas he was quoted as “undercooked” at the Miami final after only three days break in between and he played a couple of fairly competitive matches just prior. You can see how that undercook logic doesn’t really apply overall. Federer, I remember, strictly saying that it doesn’t bother his level of play even if he has to sit through 4 days in a row to play the next match – be it final or whatever. He says he still feels just as much anxious and eager to play. Again this mostly comes down to the mindset one has.

Yes but i feel for Andy he mostly has to get a "feel" for the court/surface. Theres no way he wouldnt have taken it to a 3rd set at least in Miami if he was more match sharp.Given his best of the best record at hardcourt masters finals he really should have got one over Novak again.Andy looked like he was staggering about for a lot of the IW Miami stretch.Anyway Ferrer is out so it looks like a Novak semi/final or win is more likely now.

Yes but i feel for Andy he mostly has to get a "feel" for the court/surface. Theres no way he wouldnt have taken it to a 3rd set at least in Miami if he was more match sharp.Given his best of the best record at hardcourt masters finals he really should have got one over Novak again.Andy looked like he was staggering about for a lot of the IW Miami stretch.Anyway Ferrer is out so it looks like a Novak semi/final or win is more likely now.

How can one be match sharp after two weeks of break on his least best surface in the very first match and not match sharp in a Masters final on his best surface against a guy he's beaten only a few weeks prior? That logic is completely lost on me, Bill but let's not duel on it - just though I'd point it out, though granted, you never said it in the first place.

Yes but clearly he was far from his best in that final & was relativley untested.You're probably correct though, It is more to do with his mentality for sure rather than any other kind of issue but either way the result is the same.The MC 2nd round match to me was completely surprising as I'm sure it was to you although Troicki was not at his best either.Maybe playing on clay has lost some of its difficulty to him, maybe this year he'll come of age on it. Certainly he played with a level of determination I've never seen before at this stage.He's a hard one to figure out sometimes.One other possibilty is that he has finally managed to absorb his most recent training regime and that has now started to augment his game, rather than destablise it.Now that would be promising if it were the case.